"Justin Feagin was dismissed from the team for a violation of team rules Thursday evening," head coach Rich Rodriguez said in a statement.

That's ambiguous as to whether the dismissal or the violation came Thursday, but I'm guessing it's the former.

I'm of two minds about the departure. On the one hand, it would be hard to pick out a player on the roster whose departure would be less likely to impact Michigan's performance on-field both this year and going forward. Feagin was a late flier Michigan took on the off chance he might be a viable quarterback. He was not and got bounced to slot receiver, where he wasn't a factor. With the spring emergence of Roy Roundtree and availability of freshmen Terrance Robinson (a redshirt), Jeremy Gallon, and Je'Ron Stokes, he didn't figure to be a factor in the fall. And it's not like slot receiver looks like a thin spot going forward; enough bits have been spilled about Michigan's receiver-mad recruiting class to fill all the tubes of the internets.

On the other hand, Feagin is the first Rodriguez recruit to leave [UPDATE: forgot about Taylor Hill, who left almost before he arrived] and did so in inauspicious circumstances. The email yesterday provided some murky detail on the violation of team rules and it's the sort of thing that is a no-BS immediate seeya type of thing. I'll let the actual journalists ferret out the details, as one anonymous, if prescient email does not a solid story make. I'd be surprised if it didn't end up in the papers eventually.

Though this kind of thing happens at a certain rate to all programs, it's another opportunity for evil bad PR gnomes to stroke their beards and mutter sagely about What Is Going On In Ann Arbor. And I (baselessly) liked the kid. How could you not, given the picture at right?

Also: you can subtract at least one additional point from Michigan's APR, which isn't going to be fatal or anything but it ain't good. Also also: I have Michigan at 20 scholarships for 2010 now, assuming that Cone and Wright don't get fifth years.

And, How do you know that he wasn't given a chance to earn his way back on the team and didn't earn it. AA ran the steps at the stadium every morning at 6am for the whole summer after his incidents. Maybe Feagin was given a chance to do something similar and blew it off.

neither of these two offenses are good, but on a team if someone steals from another teammate - that's inexcusable. I am not saying that drunk driving is better, but you can't trust someone you're going to war with if he's stolen from you or another friend. That's not acceptable.

Now I don't know if stealing had anything to do with the dismissal, but if it did, I can see how RR said "See Ya!"

I heard it was gambling. Feagin had hooked up with Rick Tocchet and Tim Donaghy. He supposedly laid down big bets against UM for the 3 big rivalry games. He supposedly greased the football against Notre Dame, drugged our safeties against Sparty and informed tOSU we were going to run a spread offense. All three of those games should be erased from the official record book in light of this breaking news.

I heard he recruited the rest of the scout-team offense to pose as a crew of skilled-yet-occassionally-bumbling scam artists, with Coner serving as the face man and Wermer serving as the demolition expert, and went about robbing the biggest casino in Detroit, which is run by a long-time enemy who looks somewhat like Jim Tressel.

His plan entailed wowing UM faithful with a poor-man's imitation of Pat White last season, becoming the prince of A2, then hitting up the MGM Grand the night before he played at the Motor City Bowl. During the game, while Feagin led Michigan to a big-time win over Central, Wermer's was expected to sneak into the MGM (which would be practically barren because everyone was at the game), steal the millions and millions of dollars this game generated in high-stakes gambling, then rendezvous with the rest of the crew at some hitherto-unknown locale.

Unfortunately, Feagin's plan went awry when people watched him practice and realized he could neither run nor pass like White, punctuated by a off-balance pass at practice that was so high and wide that it caused Tacopants to tear his ACL going after it. Though he was arrested by the Bench police and held without questioning for the rest of the season, some believe that he will meet up with Wermer (who was able to nab a projector and some Big Ten Taco coupons on his way out) and the rest of the crew in Indiana, where they will plan their next big heist.

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And in completely unrelated news, has anyone noticed that Ocean's 11 has been running on TNT for the past few months?

There's a huge difference from what Brian does, and what Tom Beaver does.

Brian was told something, and hasn't had it confirmed, so it would be irresponsible on his part to report it as true. Brian is also a fan first, and gets upset about this stuff just as much as everyone else. Reporting something like this, then have it be wrong would not be good.

Tom Beaver throws out ridiculous possibilities to cover his ass, in case one of the two doesn't happen. Something happened here, it's just not worth talking about, and not confirmed.

Brian didn't imply knowledge. Brian said he received an email with a story about why Feagins was dismissed. He didn't relay the story because it has not been confirmed by any other sources and the source itself has not proven his credibility. If you want to read unverified stories to satisfy your thirst for gossip, try Star magazine. Or Rob Parker.

First, how is "it" false? Feagin was dismissed for a violation of team rules. That is an iron-clad fact, and Brian reported it. Someone e-mailed him a rumor of what, exactly, Feagin did. Brian has no way of verifying it, so he's kept his mouth shut. That's not implying omniscience - he has told us how he came by his information, and he has said, in plain language, that he has no idea if the information he has is true.

Either run the story or dont. If you run it in a half-ass way like this, that just leaves everyone speculating about this young man.

For e.g. he could have done something as silly as smoke pot or as horrible as HGH or assault. We don't know. I personally don't think that's fair to the kid.

Maybe I wasn't perfectly clear in my previous post, I am NOT asking Brian to tell us what is in the email, I am suggesting to him that he should never have mentioned the following:

" The email yesterday provided some murky detail on the violation of team rules and it's the sort of thing that is a no-BS immediate seeya type of thing."

This is cowardly in my opinion.

BTW, this is absolute proof that the point system doesn't work. I am not allowed to voice concerns? If you do not share my concerns is that grounds for docking points? I know some would just love for this to turn into North Korea....but I don't think Brian intends that.

Is someone stopping you from saying something? You can get negged to oblivion and you can still respond to anything you want. Freedom of speech doesn't guarantee you the right to speak without dissent.

Further, I think you actually have something of a point. The issue is how you phrased it. You could have voiced your concerns in a respectful manner:

"I think Brian merely should have written what he's willing to say - not alluded to things he doesn't without revealing them. That's not fair to Justin Feagin."

Instead, you called him "half-ass" and "cowardly" and said he "lacked cahones (sic)". Do you see why one may be perceived like you're being an asshole to the proprietor of the site, and the other is a voicing of a legitimate concern?

I just saw a comment thread where someone admitted to a mistake after being confronted by a reasoned argument. Someone take a screenshot, stat, and send it to Guinness for posterity. ALL THAT CAME BEFORE IS NO MORE.